New Unreal Tournament will be free-to-play

The makers of Gears Of War have announced they’re making a new Unreal Tournament on PC, and they want your help to do it.

We’re not sure whether younger gamers will even know what Unreal Tournament is anymore, since it’s never made much of an impact on consoles, but back in 1999 it was one of the most influential multiplayer first person shooters of the time.

Epic Games has struggled to keep it relevant since though and there hasn’t been a new sequel since Unreal Tournament III in 2007. But now they’re rebooting the series with a new free-to-play title, despite insisting only last month that they weren’t planning on making any more entries (proof yet again that sometimes developers lie).

According to the developers the new game, called simply Unreal Tournament, will be made in close collaboration with fans and will be designed according to suggestions and ideas put forward by the community.

They’ll also embrace the modding community before the game has even been finished, allowing budding developers to create their own maps, weapons, play modes, and total conversions. The creators will then be able to sell their mods to others via Epic’s marketplace, or give them away for free.

The core game itself though will be entirely free, with Epic promising ‘no microtransactions’ either at launch or with future updates.

Of course nowadays it’s hard to say when a game like this is really finished, although Epic warn it will be several months before they have anything playable to show. At that stage the game will be Deathmatch-only, while other modes such as Capture the Flag and series staple Onslaught will be added later.

Naturally the game will use Epic’s new Unreal Engine 4 technology, and since it’s their baby it should end up being one of the best looking shooters of the next few years.